ReShade Full Add-on Support and DLSS 5 Neural Rendering in Firestorm and the Official Viewer
Devil Mother
Hello,
I would like to ask the Second Life development team for clarification regarding the use of ReShade, DLSS 5 Neural Rendering, and third-party rendering add-ons with both the official Second Life Viewer and the Firestorm Viewer.
I am interested in using DLSS 5 Neural Rendering strictly for visual quality and rendering performance, particularly for photography and video recording in Second Life. I am not trying to obtain any gameplay advantage, automate actions, interact with other residents, modify the simulator, bypass permissions, or change any shared-world functionality.
My current system is Windows 11 with an NVIDIA RTX 4070 Ti SUPER. Firestorm is currently using OpenGL.
The setup I am investigating works approximately as follows:
ReShade is installed for OpenGL.
DLSS5-Feeder is used to provide the necessary motion-vector input.
LumeniteFX Kernel is used as the motion-vector provider.
A DLSS 5/RenoDX add-on (renodx-dlss5.addon64) is used to provide the Neural Rendering functionality.
ReShade requires its Full Add-on Support build for this particular add-on to load.
The setup uses an opengl32.dll supplied by ReShade next to the viewer executable.
The normal ReShade build works with Firestorm, but it refuses to load the DLSS 5 add-on and reports that the current ReShade build has only limited add-on functionality. When I investigated the Full Add-on Support version, ReShade itself displayed a warning stating that this build is intended for single-player games and may cause bans in multiplayer games.
Because Second Life is a multi-user service, I do not want to proceed without understanding whether this type of modification is permitted.
My questions are:
- Official Second Life Viewer
Would it be permitted to use ReShade Full Add-on Support with the official Linden Lab Second Life Viewer, including loading a third-party rendering add-on such as renodx-dlss5.addon64?
Would using an external opengl32.dll supplied by ReShade be permitted if its only purpose is to intercept the viewer's OpenGL rendering and apply visual effects?
Would using DLSS 5 Neural Rendering in this way be considered a prohibited modification of the viewer or Second Life experience?
- Firestorm Viewer
Would the same configuration be permitted with the Firestorm Viewer, assuming the modification is performed locally by the individual user and is not part of the Firestorm viewer distribution?
Does Firestorm have any specific policy or technical restriction against ReShade Full Add-on Support, DLSS5-Feeder, RenoDX, or other third-party rendering add-ons?
- Account safety
Could using ReShade Full Add-on Support and DLSS 5 Neural Rendering in either viewer result in an account warning, suspension, or other enforcement action?
I am particularly concerned because ReShade itself displays a warning that its Full Add-on Support build may cause bans in multiplayer games.
- Visual-only modification
Would the situation be different if the technology is used exclusively for:
improving image quality;
improving rendering performance;
photography;
machinima/video recording;
reducing aliasing or improving temporal reconstruction;
and does not provide any additional interaction, automation, information about other users, permissions bypass, content export, or gameplay advantage?
- Officially supported alternatives
If this particular ReShade/DLSS 5 implementation is not permitted, is there an officially supported or policy-compliant way to use DLSS, DLSS 5, neural rendering, or another AI-based upscaling/rendering technology with either the official Second Life Viewer or Firestorm?
I would especially appreciate clarification on whether the answer differs between the official Linden Lab viewer and Firestorm, since Firestorm is a third-party viewer but is widely used within the Second Life community. Linden Lab currently identifies Firestorm as one of the third-party viewers available for Second Life.
I am asking before proceeding because I do not want to accidentally violate the Second Life Terms of Service or Third-Party Viewer Policy.
Thank you for any clarification you can provide.
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AlettaMondragon Resident
Don't take this for granted because I'm a resident like you, but since this is a virtual world and not a competitive game, there's no gameplay advantage you can get with this - so on that account you don't have to worry.
Then there are all kinds of third party viewers and self compiled viewers used by individuals, who knows what they modified in and added to those. Basically a huge rendering overhaul that only applies on your end anyway should be fine.
That being said it would be nice if a Linden confirmed this for you, it would be also nice to see their point of view about improvements on their end as well. Seeing how it took them about 3 years to implement PBR incorrectly and now they are full steam ahead trying to rebuild the PBR viewer
properly
, this is probably something that is way above their level of course.Devil Mother
I am planning to use ReShade to enhance graphics, lighting, and depth effects in Second Life, primarily for virtual photography and rendering.
I specifically downloaded the ReShade with Full Add-on Support build. From a technical standpoint, this build is required because it is the only way to integrate and test external pipeline modifications—such as forcing DLSS frame generation or upscaling layers—into OpenGL-based Third-Party Viewers (like Firestorm).
Upon launching, it displays the standard warning stating that the Add-on build is intended for single-player games only and may trigger bans in multiplayer environments.
Since Second Life does not use traditional competitive anti-cheat systems, I would like to clarify a few points with the developer community:
Does Linden Lab or the Third-Party Viewer (TPV) Policy prohibit using the Full Add-on / Depth-Buffer enabled version of ReShade?
Is there any risk of automated account flags or bans when injecting this DLL build into OpenGL SL viewers?
Are there any known engine crashes or compatibility issues when running the Add-on version alongside PBR/GLTF rendering features?
I want to ensure full compliance with the Terms of Service before using it.
Thank you for your help!
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